Fates not Set in Stone
by NekoYOkami
Summary: The rewrite of Songs of Fate, without the song-fic attempt attached to it. "The War for Cybertron rages on, and more sparks are brought into the conflict as time goes. Two sparkling's fate and lives change as an old hatred is renewed, with only each other to trust, and only adventures can reveal the future." Rated for safety; Warnings Inside!
1. Story of Two Sparks

Neko: Testing, testing, one, two, three, can everyone hear us?

Ookami: Well, I hear you well enough, why do we need to ask again?

Neko: It's been a while I hoping the equipment is still working.

Ookami: I guess that's fair. We finally got some time to actually sit down and write.

Neko: Henhenhen yeah... Well anyways... Welcome to everyone, New and old!

Ookami: We did announce we may be rewriting Songs of Fate, though it started a lot faster than anticipated...

Neko: I think this will be fun, horribly heartbreaking, but fun!

ZephyrShift: It'll at least be fun getting some more attention again for us.

LunarCascade: Yeah! Though I don't think we will want to hang out around here while they do the first few chapters...

ZephyrShift: That's true... But seeing people react to the chapters will be more fun than reading the stuff ourselves, right?

Ookami: Oh, that's right, we kinda have a random, well not so random, question for everyone.

Neko: Who has a sadder back story? Nightaria or Windrider?

Ookami: Feel free to leave your response in the comments!~ Or not, if you don't really care about the two...

Sunny: Whether it is nobler to have loved and lost, or to have never loved at all I know not.

Silver: And do remember that these two obviously own no rights to things that are obviously from other creative minds.

Neko: Ok on that note, please do enjoy the first chapter of Fates not Set in Stone!

 ****

The tale Nightaria

Sparks can be made one of two ways, bestowed upon a frame by the all spark, or by the merging of two sparks. Some see the later as pure hearsay and as a horrible thing, but others do not. One note about spark merging, you don't have to be spark-bonded to do it, but it's suggested you are. Otherwise, tragedy can strike. As is the case for Nightaria a sparkling produced from two not bonded, Starburst and her lover. Starburst did not want a sparkling, especially not with someone she wasn't bonded to, but she still had the sparkling and even gave it a designation. She took care of the sparkling purely out of duty, she knew her previous lover would not have any love for it. If that was the end of the story then everything would have been ok for Nightaria. But fate had another plan for this sparkling. Starburst met a wonderful Mech and soon they built a relationship, but Starburst realized that he truly despised bot's who made sparklings instead of having them gifted to them by the All Spark. Starburst hadn't told her new love anything about having a sparkling, and so she came up with a plan to get rid of Nightaria. Just dropping her off at an orphanage wouldn't work because Nightaria could still be traced back to her, And it's not like Nightaria would understand if Starburst said to tell everyone that her Caretakers were killed in the war. No the only way to truly rid herself of the shackle she foolishly bound herself with would be to give the child to her ex-lover. He could make sure that no one would ever find out. So one-day Starburst took Nightaria out for the day, and that night when she returned she was free from her bonds, and free to get together with her new love, it had only cost her a spark.

Nightaria was confused and sad, her carrier had just given her to this big scary Mech called Shockwave. She was given to him with the strict instructions that no one could find out who Starburst was to her. Nightaria was left with the realization that Shockwave was her other Maker as well. So Nightaria just allowed Shockwave to bring her to where ever it is that he wanted her. And time passed, Nightaria was no longer called Nightaria but rather subject 188, and while Nightaria had a life with (some) love and freedom subject 188 had a life with loneliness other than her constant companion of pain. 188 had no freedom, everything in her life was controlled by Shockwave, where she would recharge, refuel, rest, and heal. Every little thing was controlled, she only ever got to talk to other sparkling in experiments, and they would normally either be mad at her or cry too much to talk to. She sometimes tried to talk to Shockwave but he wasn't the most responsive thing. And slowly she got so fed up so in need of an escape that she tapped into herself ever so slightly and she learned a special skill. She learned how to let go of all that she was feeling emotionally and physically, and to just look at the world completely logically. It helped her survive her "life" and Shockwave did not disapprove of the newly learned skill, in fact, the skill was quite helpful with some of his experiments. And so life went on until one fateful day that changed Subject 188's life forever.

The tale of WindRunner

For a young sparkling, WindRunner was happy she had several older younglings that she could play with all the time. They tended to be the creations of the other guardsmechs and femmes that her parents worked with. Not many of the others were her age, so she had to try to keep up or deal with the scrapes and denting when she got home. Chromia would tend to the removal of these while thinking if they were aiming for actual damage on the rougher game days. Ironhide, on the other servo, made sure she knew what to do if she needed to get out of a harmful hold from the others. When they both went to teach her about defending herself, they would commlink talk about the war that was brewing. After they realized that she was listening in, however, both of her creators would lightly scold her on using telepathic abilities to know what they were thinking. The older younglings always seem to know what that meant but responded to Windrunner that we younglings had nothing to worry about since all of our creators and caretakers were the strongest of mechs and femmes and anyone who wanted to mess with them would be stopped by them before they could have a chance to do harm. She believed them wholeheartedly and didn't think about it while the others hadn't felt the need to think about it. It came to hurt her at the end of her time with them though, as she only barely felt the brush of a malicious thought before the world went dark around her.

She woke up to an unusual feeling room according to her wings, though her helm hurt too much to make much sense of the information anyway. When the world no longer felt that the world was trying to move around without permission, WindRunner sat slowly up and online her optics to a small room that was dull metal with the cold hard surface that she was on was supposed to be a berth of some type, but was hardly worth being called as such. The other side of the room appeared to have some form of electric barring system, like the ones that her creators would think about every once and a while. There was also a silhouette in the brightened hallway compared to the darkened room she had been placed inside. Deciding that breaking the rules would be the best way to try and figure out what had happened, she looked into the processor of the one outside but found it unable to comprehend anything further than commands in specific sections. Shivering at the unnatural feeling of emptiness, she proceeded to figure out how the orders were organized so she could get it to open the exit for her. Taking a lot longer than it should of and running into many orders and command sequences that made no sense to her at this age, she finally got it to open the bars. Stepping outside the barred area, however, led to the drone immediately attempting to grab her and block off her escape. Out of instinct borne of protective creators and roughhousing with those older than her, she dodged the grabbing servos and went to hit the center of the frame. Before it could properly connect she was being lifted off the ground by servos that were huge. The hold shifted, and she faced a singular giant red optic. A deep, gravelly yet clearly spoken voice reaches her audios after a moment.

"Subject 293, escaping from holding cell will result in punishment. Punishment shall be delayed for the commencement of Project 190."


	2. The Beginning

Author Notes:

Ookami: Hey guys! We came back within the month we said we would!

Neko: So far so good on our new year's resolution! Always great news.

Ookami: It even is a long chapter, with some tornado emotions. Um, sorry?

Neko: yeah 3,278 words, so like 3 times the size of the first chapter... but yeah sorry about the emotions and all...

Ookami: Details: We don't own anything you recognize, which will be very little in comparison to other chapters, outside of our works.

Neko: So enjoy!

 **Chapter 2: The Beginning**

After the declaration of delayed punishment, the giant mech changed his grip so WindRunner was only held in one servo and proceeded to move away from the room she was in. Not understanding what the mech had meant, she asked, "What do you mean by Subject 293? My designation is WindRunner. And what kind of project would it be that would involve me without my creators around?"

Not slowing his pedsteps nor looking down at her the mech responded, "Subject 293 is to respond to Subject 293 unless informed otherwise. Insisting another designation without approval will result in punishment. All Subjects belong to me, any previous creators or caretakers do not have control over my Subjects." After a few doors, the mech handled a panel that led to an elevator arriving on the other side. He stepped into the enclosed area and indicated a floor amongst a confusing configuration of buttons.

The series of events from Windrunner's perspective had made no sense since she woke up, and the latent emotions of the mech seemed nonexistent. Deciding that looking at his mind was the only way she was going to learn anything, she tentatively slinks into his processor. There, it appears that he is focusing on two charts and notes being made beyond them. 188 and 293 were numbered and skills and spark signatures. The information on 293 looked like things that she knew about herself, including the telepathic ability. Suddenly she is thrown out of his mind as a large dose of electricity goes through her frame, making her processor fritz slightly.

"-ject 293," his voice cuts in after the static cleared from her hearing, "using abilities upon me or other unauthorized targets will result in punishment. The punishment will not be lenient in the future." He continued to walk right before he finished informing her of the consequences.

Reeling from the processor shock and trying to understand how that could be considered lenient in that mech's processor, WindRunner lost track of how many corridors and doors were passed in this impractical maze. Soon the mech seems to start to slow down to a stop, causing her to return to reviewing her surroundings. The cell that the mech stopped in front was quite a surprising sight from the dullness of the rest of the building.

The base of the room was like the rest of the cells that she had seen before, but there was a splattering of colors all around the lower part of the room walls and on the floor. The supposed berth was much of the same state, but with more energon blue and pink scrapes across the surface, low enough that it could be easily reached by a sparkling or youngling. And there was a sparkling in the room, only colored by dried energon and the remnants of bright pink that most likely was her original paint job, curled in a corner and grew tighter on itself when the purple frame entered their line of sight.

Within moments the bars had been disengaged and WindRunner found herself on the floor of the battered room as the bars had returned to their original state. "Experiment 190 will begin immediately," the giant mech said from the other side of the bars, "Subjects 188 and 293 are to interact with each other for the cumulative total of three hours. Results will be reviewed at the end of that time frame." Without another sound, he left the two in the cell together.

Subject 188 unwound from her ball as life returned to her optics. She stood up and slowly approached the new sparkling. "...Hello, I'm 188, your designation is 293 right?" Subject 188 asked apprehensively.

WindRunner had been surprised with how much emotion had suddenly appeared in the other sparkling considering it hadn't felt like it at first. "Um, that is what I apparently am supposed to be called while here. I don't appreciate it though." She stayed where she was, unsure of what the other was thinking really.

Subject 188 stopped a few feet in front of WindRunner and spoke again. "So you are super new then... typically the others spend like a day or so before they are they have this one done... umm so... sorry I'm not the best at talking... but umm...Oh! How did you end up here?"

"Well, I was taken from the youth building that all the guardmech and femmes creations normally end up staying during their shifts. It was disorienting waking up after that. Not sure how my creators will take the fact I'm not at home..."

"I'm sorry," 188 says " that must be hard for you...-did" 188 stops and rephrases what she was going to say"...were your creators nice?"

WindRunner, who was not going to quit considering herself anything but that, replied, "Yeah, they were nice. Taught me a lot of how to protect myself from roughhousing younglings and the odd untrained adult, but always out of concern for me." Looking at 188, she decided to ask, "If you are asking that, were yours not so nice?"

188 flinched slightly at the question before she spoke "No, no they weren't, carrier gave me away... and... and...," 188 seem scared to vocalize the next part, whether it was fear of the fact or fear of how WindRunner would respond is unknown, her vents kicking in she spoke again, " and the other creator... he is the big scary purple mech."

Giving her a solid look, and knowing that this wasn't any form of joking, WindRunner decided on the response, "Yeah, that definitely not the definition of nice creators... That would require a minimum of fewer bars and a lot more care on how others think of them. Though that may have been with the other one, that supposed creator of yours is not one who cares about anymech but himself."

188 looked at WindRunner with surprise clearly written on her, "Y-you don't hate me?" she whispers out.

Now it was WindRunner that seemed surprised, "Why would I hate you? I mean, your supposed creator is a big scary purple mech that doesn't care that his sparkling looks like slag, but that doesn't make you the same as him. In fact, you have shown more cybertronian habits than he has in the last few minutes than the entire time I've seen him."

188 seemed truly shocked that WindRunner had no negative feelings towards her, and so did the only thing her processor told her to do. 188 quickly closed the gap between the two pulling WindRunner into a hug, as small sobs escaped her along with the repeated phrase of " ...thank you...thank you...thank you..."

WindRunner had to stop the urge of throwing off the small frame that jumped her as the femme was crying on her shoulder, the thought of threat died down with each grateful sob that arose. Tentatively hugging her back, as the small frame was obviously still damaged, she said, "Well, I guess you are welcome? Though ahm sure that my creators would love to take a swing at your creators if ahm the kindest sparkling that you have met..."

188 sniffs and lets go of WindRider as she speaks " Yeah... all the others before you always ended up blaming me for them being here, for them going through the pain they had since he is my creator so I... I should be able to do something... some would even just attack me as soon as they found out...I just... I don't ever know what to do... "

WindRider stayed relaxed about the seemingly younger femme being next to her as she listened to the problems that had happened in the past. "Yeah, I can see why they would, but a sparkling can't stop a full-grown mech on their own. Mah caretakers would have talked about that logic being silly, but I guess ahm the only one that'll be here for a while."

188 nods "It lasts, for 3 hours, so you will be here for a bit... I wonder if after the experiment fails if we will see each other again..."

"What?" WindRunner asked before her processor caught up with her, "Oh, never mind. Silly question. I was saying how mah caretakers won't be around to add their opinions of the big mech for a while yet. Though, it would be nice ta know if you survive this place after that 3-hour mark too."

188 smiled at 293, " I would love to learn it if you would teach me..., I never really get to see the others... unless... they... are being disposed of... and it passes by my room." 188's smile faded as she tensed as if she was once again preparing to be attacked.

Keeping herself as relaxed as possible with the tense frame next to her, WindRunner remarked, "Do you really get to see many of those though really? This place is a maze of mech proportions, and I doubt anyone really is kept on the same floor with how messy the design is."

"Sometimes I think they pass by on purpose, to remind me that I'm easy to replace... I don't try to remember how many limp forms have passed by, whether they are sparklings or full-grown mechs..."

WindRunner was quiet for a moment, taking that information in before saying, "Or how insane it is that you survived as long as you did. If you have seen even half of the people between our numbers pass by ya, then you would know that the others were considered too weak for this. Even full-grown mechs can't handle being played rough with after a while, not if their sparks aren't wanting to deal with it."

188 fiddled with her fingers for a second before she spoke, " I... I... have an ability... that makes it so that I can fully," 188 seemed to struggle with her words, "um... stop being me... for a bit at least..."

WindRunner looked at her a little odd before saying, "Does it make emotions or physical information hard to transmit or something? When the mech was coming around the corner I barely could tell someone was here, and I am best on finding hidden younglings in those kinds of games."

188 looks at 293 and tilted her head" umm It kinda stops emotions and physical feelings... but how did you know that?"

WindRunner kind of froze at realizing that she just admitted that, but remembered that the big mech knew already so it wasn't really a secret here. "I kind of naturally sense out the minds of others, and with focus can see what they are thinking on. Did that with the big mech, kinda got fried for doing that though."

188 stared slightly at 293 " so... you're a telepath then?... Shockwave, um mentioned that he had found one... not to me, but I overheard..."

"Well, technically, yeah I am," WindRunner replied, "Though I don't really use the term since it attracts attention when I don't want it. Instead, I normally say I'm simply spark sensitive."

188 nodded "So I guess we both are a little odd then... um I don't really know much about telepaths, like if you can control it or not, and you don't have to tell me, but um... if you accidentally... no, nevermind it's stupid... sorry..." 188 abruptly changed the conversation, " Oh! So! What did you do in the youth building?"

Figuring whatever she was saying before would come up if she really wanted to say it, WindRunner answered, "Well, we learned some new stuff from the caremechs and femmes, but mostly we got to play and wait for our caretakers to come to pick us up after they work." Thinking for a moment, she continued, "The mechs and femmes normally kept us from playing too rough, but allowed us to learn new games and didn't stop us from learning something the harder way unless it was gonna really hurt us or others."

188's optics lit up, "That's so cool! So like a lot of sparklings, and younglings playing games... I can kinda remember a game that, um..." 188 paused, looking to be mulling over words before she gave up and spoke again, " well, my Carrier, played with me once, but it was really simple."

WindRunner held off mentioning her caretakers for the umpteenth time, and instead responded with, "Yeah, though some of the older younglings had started education facility learning, so would also work on stuff they had to bring with them. They would still play, but the mechs and femmes would make sure the work got done first. It was funny to see them have trouble with how it worked at times."

"That sounds nice..." 188 went quiet mulling over the idea of it, it was hard for her to imagine, the intracity of the youth building as an idea, much less with many beings all doing different things, and the fact that there didn't seem to be an end goal. It wasn't just a place to have fun, it wasn't a place just to learn, not a place to fight, not a place to rest, it may have also been a place to eat, but the place seemed too good to be real, but too intricate to be fake. 188 finally spoke again, " It sounds like a nice place..." she restated, 188 wanted to bring up her almost inability to trust the information but decided against it, "yeah it sounds nice."

Watching the seemingly younger femme try to understand what WindRunner said was quite a show of confusion. Attempting to try and clear some of that, and also so there wasn't any real misunderstanding, WindRunner responded, "Yeah, it was a nice place, since it was designed for younglings mostly. The really young sparklings weren't allowed really, so the sparklings were mostly able to interact with everyone when they joined in. There was always that introduction song that we would always do too, so there was little confusion of which mech was which. It went like this:

Jump in, jump out; Turn yourself about; Jump in, jump out; Introduce yourself

Designation is WindRunner, And I'm a Seeker, Wanna be a Racer,

And I'm here to play with you!

Jump in, jump out; Turn yourself about; Jump in, jump out; Introduce yourself"

188 paused as soon as she hears the rhythm and at the end of WindRunners turn she began, "Jump in, jump out turn yourself about; Jump in, jump out Introduce yourself Designation is Nightaria, And I'm a Seeker, Wanna be a Singer, And I'm here to play with you! Jump in, jump out; Turn yourself about; Jump in, jump out; Say it with a shout!" 188 finched and froze as she realized what she just sang.

WindRunner was smiling in victory as she got to see that the femme knew the song, but it was removed from her faceplate when she froze at the end. "Um, Night Aria?" she started with but hesitated when a bigger flinch occurred at the designation being used, "Uh, 188 then, what is wrong? I thought you did the song perfectly."

188 was softly mumbling, almost inaudibly, "..bad designation, shock, bad designation, shock, bad designation..." 188's vents kicked up and optics seemed devoid of everything but panic and fear, she had broken the rule, and during an experiment no less, the punishment would be delivered at any moment now she knew it, as she spiraled deeper into her own processor.

Between the phrase being repeated softly that it could barely be heard over the vent fans working overtime and the lack of any other action from her, WindRunner held the frame against her own as she tried to figure out how to help NIght Aria. "188?" She stated, making sure she was clear and louder than the rest of the noise, but it had no response. Sighing, she pushed her processor out of its casing mentally and look inside the panicking youngling next to her.

WindRunner was almost thrown out of the second processor that day when she found herself in something that looked like a rust storm in mental form, memories and immediate knowledge being thrown about and disoriented in no logical manner. In the clear area that could be seen, a couple of the thoughts and memories were growing out of their probable size, and seem to override the priority thoughts of Night Aria, the femme looking like a light point that was fluctuating in the chaos. Shifting her mental self through the storm with as little interacting with thoughts and memories that weren't hers to see, Windrunner got to the center to see what was causing the terror. It was actually four thoughts, some of them being overlapping memories and others seem to just be focused on the written form of Night Aria's true designation. Not even looking at the memories that were overlapped they felt very painful, while there was a new one that was of her singing the song. Finally realizing what the problem was, WindRunner started to mentally push the painful memories out of the eye of the storm. Phantom pains tried to convince her that she couldn't move them, but she continued to push them into the maelstrom, hoping that the winds would scatter the fear enough to allow them to break out of the situation together. The memory cluster was rather large, but as the first parts of it hit the storm it broke away and the storm had seemed to lose a little force. Renewed determination lead to half of the memory pile being shoved into the disastrous winds that died with more and more of the fear being scattered amongst the other memories. The winds, along with he overblown memory files, dissipated into nothing. She watched as the memories, data, and immediate information restructured itself into a proper formula and tried to predict how it should look like for future reference before turning to the glowing form of Night Aria's consciousness. 'You well enough for me to leave?' was written in the air as WindRunner still couldn't talk in this state, and verbally wouldn't reach properly. With a mostly affirmative brightening of the orb, she nodded at it and left so Night Aria could finish sorting herself out and return to reality at her pace.

After WindRunner left her mind, Nightaria felt her processor slowly reorder everything, it was peaceful in her mind as memories, information, and data slowly moved and reconnected with each other. Nightaria thought it was strange referring to herself as Nightaria, 188 had been her designation for so much more of her memories, but it didn't feel wrong, just slightly painful. Nightaria had come to associate that designation with blinding pain, a shock so strong it forced her to crash. Nightaria was the designation that her Carrier gave her, and the feeling of betrayal and hurt that came whenever her processor turned to her carrier hurt almost as much as the memories did, but Nightaria liked the way that WindRunner said her designation, she liked the look of care in her optics, so Nightaria decided that Windrunner could call her that, at least as long as Shockwave wasn't around.

NightAria's optics came back to life and she smiled, "Thank you WindRunner, thank you." It was a short sentence but it had as much passion, and genuine thanks as 188 could put behind it, the real world made it harder to speak your processor after all.


End file.
